Blueberry

Here's a trick you can try right now. For an immediate sneak-preview of Blueberry's peyote-soaked finale, scrunch the ball of your palms firmly into your eye sockets. The ensuing geometric light show is but a fraction of what's on offer in this loose adaptation of Jean 'Moebius' Giraud's comic strip. In the 1870s, wild-child Mike Blueberry (Cassel) is adopted by Chiracahua Indians and, Carlos Castaneda-style, initiated into their shamanic rituals. Later, as a small-town sheriff, he encounters an old nemesis, the mysterious Wally Blount (Madsen), on the hunt for hidden Indian 'gold', climaxing in an all-out, psychedelic showdown. Suffice to say, the treasure Blount seeks isn't of the bankable variety (but it glimmers all the same). Blueberry's pretty unique; its closest cousin is probably that other 'existentialist Western' El Topo. And like Jodorowsky's movie, it's mesmerising at best, unfocused and pretentious at worst. There's some gorgeous cinematography here, while the astonishing CGI-rendered visions (featuring multi-tentacled hydras and other entheogenic plant spirits commonly reported from such trips) not only make 2001's 'Star Gate' sequence look like a walk in the park, but have also been authenticated and approved by real-life South American shamans. That's partly the problem: director Kounen spent a long time researching among the shamans, and Blueberry does betray the conviction of the newly converted at the narrative's expense; the cast (including Eddie Izzard cameoing as a Prussian mercenary) often seem slightly bemused themselves. A failure, then, but a noble and courageous one.

Magic hallucinographic camera work brings you to a place of meaning. Strange and piercing, beautifully realized, moment to moment intensity, much more than its constituent parts. There is a serene grittiness to the ritual of film watching in this movie and I'm only 10 minutes into it. Most visionary films are impersonal, devoted to generalities and archetypes. This film is personal, almost quirky, yet relevant in its native originality. We see situations that are reminiscent of some distant calling yet brought to an immediate unfolding of growth and the danger of independent growth. One might be entertained by this motion picture if self comparison can be called entertainment.

This is a visual diamond. The frame composition of this movie is amazing! every frame is like a well planed and composed photograph. The music is also wonderful and supports each scene in a remarkable way. BUT, the digital effects gets out of hand and takes over the movie. they should be supporting it, not drown it. The hallucination scenes are very complex and confusing and should have been simplified to bring the story forward. (why do the directors get so carried away by digital effects? they of all, should know that it is the story and the "flow" of the movie that is important, not the amount of digital effects you can put in it!) However, this movie is definitely worth watching, but don't expect a conventional action western!

This is an odd duck of a movie. I became interested since I'm a fan of Eddie Izzard who plays a mad Prussian lusting for gold. I knew it would be intriguing since its based on a Moebius comic strip, but I wasn't really expecting what I got.

The movie tells the story of Mike Blueberry, a US Marshall in the old west. As he lays "dying" we drift back through his life, stopping at about the point the crazed Prussian is getting everyone hot with gold fever and an old enemy returns to haunt him. Add to the mix shaman, bounty hunters, spirits, double crosses and peyote (for the crew as well as the cast) and you have a unique western.

Its a weird film with portents and visions criss crossing with hypnotic cinematography. This is a movie that looks great. There is a first rate cast, although I do have to say that I found some of the accents, Izzard's and star Vincent Cassel's a bit out of place.

Pretty much everything works except the screenplay which seems intent on being oblique for the hell of it. There is a heavy dose of Indian mysticism that seems to have been put there just to make things seem like they have a deep meaning (I think there was too much peyote behind the scenes). I'm not sure they do. The obliqueness and constant mystic reference slow the movie down to a crawl. After a while I stopped caring and started to look for the DVD remote. (Even worse is the fact that you have to pay attention to this movie or you're going to end up lost, so once I found the remote I had to back it up to see what I missed.) This is not a bad film, its just a rather dull and confused one. I'm sure in the right frame of mind this plays wonderfully, but I haven't determined what that is. I've rated it five out of ten because of the parts. The parts are interesting even if the whole is often a crashing bore. For fans of the cast, rabid western fans and those looking for head trip films only.

I've read all the series of the Blueberry cartoons in fact I still have the whole series on my bookshelf. I first was disappointed with the fact that this Blueberry character doesn't look any near the Blueberry Cartoon figure. But the spirit of the cartoons can be found back in this movie. I think they did a better job trying to catch some of the Cartoon spirit rather than trying to copy the original Cartoons which is very difficult anyway because even in cartoons you still have that personal touch of fantasy which always gets destroyed by making a movie of some Novel or in this case, Cartoon. Very nice to see a more "Holistic" approach towards the "Cowboy-Indian" theme. It's a good thing to realize that this native Americans had a much more healthier attitude to nature than we do and we should learn from them now we know that we already destroyed some of it. When I think about American Indians I also have that holistic feeling about them so for me this Movie adds up to that. See the movie yourself when you are in a chill mood and you will certainly appreciate it.

P.S. Nice to finally know how Tsi Nah-Pha (Broken Nose)is pronounced.